Wednesday, April 27, 2011

The White iPhone is OUT!

Apple has finally confirmed that the long expected WHITE iPhone will become available for sale on Apple.com, Apple stores, authorized Apple resellers, and AT&T/Verizon stores.

The, almost a year long waiting, was caused, according to Apple, by the manufacture process which turned out to be "more challenging to than expected".

A press release by Apple's senior vice president of worldwide product marketing, Philip Schiller states that: "The white iPhone 4 has finally arrived and it's beautiful". Through Schiller voice, Apple also somehow apologies to its customers: "We appreciate everyone who has waited patiently while we've worked to get every detail right."

AT&T's "no commitment" prices start from $499 for a 8GB iPhone 3GS and go up to $699 for a 32GB iPhone 4, and it's cheaper than Verizon, who charges $650 for a no-commitment 16GB iPhone 4 and $750 for the 32GB model.
Other than that, AT&T also offers a wide range of iPhone versions, with prices starting from $19 for a refurbished iPhone 3GS - 8 GB, while only the 16GB and 32GB versions of iPhone 4G are available with Verizon.

PlayStation Network Hack Leaks Sensitive Info of Over 70 Million Users

After claiming for days that its PlayStation network is under maintenance, Sony finally admitted that it has been targeted by a hacking attack, therefor the network has been taken down for investigation by security experts that the company contacted in order to help fix the issue and secure the network.

Not only the gaming network has been affected, the outage also affected the film rental site LoveFilm, as service that is also running over the PS network. Problems have also been reported by the Netflix users.

The company's official position mentions that sensitive data, like credit card information, might have fallen into the hands of an "unauthorized person".

In an attempt to hide the hacking and stop the intrusion, Sony kept the truth from the users, and while it all started on Wednesday, the company waited until yesterday to make the announcement. In a blog post by Head of Communication, Nick Chaplin, the company announces that: "certain PlayStation Network and Qriocity service user account information was compromised in connection with an illegal and unauthorized intrusion into our network." To add to the users' reasons to be unhappy with their membership, not only that the information has been kept away for a week, but they just found out that their info is not encrypted inside the PSN network.

Mr. Chaplin came up with even more excuses in his today's blog post:
"There’s a difference in timing between when we identified there was an intrusion and when we learned of consumers’ data being compromised. We learned there was an intrusion 19th April and subsequently shut the services down. We then brought in outside experts to help us learn how the intrusion occurred and to conduct an investigation to determine the nature and scope of the incident. It was necessary to conduct several days of forensic analysis, and it took our experts until yesterday to understand the scope of the breach. We then shared that information with our consumers and announced it publicly yesterday evening. "

The network's 77 million users have also been emailed about the issue and have been warned that they are at risk of fraud and have been advised to  keep a close eye on their bank accounts.

Knowing that most of the online people use the same combination of user name and password, not only their credit cards and PSN accounts are in danger. The hacker(s) can use the email address/password combination to try and break into the users' email accounts where further sensitive information to access other accounts can be found. 

Changing password for the other services they use would be the right thing to do now. 

Going to the bank and disabling the credit card and ask for a new one would be another smart thing to do, if the bank allows it, and even if it does, this will probably cost extra. I would do it and send the bill to Sony.

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Change.org attacked by Chinese government

In a digital letter sent to its members, Change.org announces that the site has been a target to cyber attacks coming from China, probably ordered by the Chinese government. This is the third day in a row when the Change.org site is attacked by Chinese government coordinated hackers.

Amazon Web Services hosted Change.org now reports:

"Change.org is currently unavailable due to a problem at our hosting provider"

While AWS Service Health Dashboard reports instance connectivity, latency and error rates for its Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud  node in N. Virginia and database instance connectivity and latency issues in the same node.


The hackers aren't particularly targeting the website, but a petition hosted on it. The targeted petition is demanding the release of Chinese artist Ai Weiwei and it's been signed by over 100,000 people.

Acclaimed dissident artist Ai Weiwei -- who helped design the famed “Bird’s Nest” stadium for China’s Olympics -- was arrested on April 3rd by Chinese security forces at the Beijing airport. His office and studio have been ransacked, and no one has heard from him since.
The international art community, including the directors of more than twenty leading museums (including the Tate Modern, Museum of Modern Art, and the Guggenheim) started a petition on Change.org. The petition quickly gained worldwide attention, including in the New York TimesLA Times, and Guardian, triggering reactions from political leaders around the world, who are calling for Weiwei's release. Activists have organized peaceful protests at Chinese embassies and consulates.

When the petition page will be available, you can help by signing the petition:
http://www.change.org/petitions/call-for-the-release-of-ai-weiwei
Due to these repeated attacks, the site may be slower than usual or unavailable at times over the next few days.

As Change.org's Patrick says: "Autocratic governments know that the internet is a democratizing force, and they'll do everything they can to suppress online activism. Know that we stand with you for change, and that we will continue to fight to make sure your voice can be heard. "

Update: Due to attacks on Change.org, Amazon WS customers may experience collateral damage, reddit.com already announced that:

" reddit is in "emergency read-only mode" right now because Amazon is experiencing a degradation. they are working on it but we are still waiting for them to get to our volumes. you won't be able to log in. we're sorry and will fix the site as soon as we can. "

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

The Evian babies are back!


Here is the new "Live young" experience from Evian!


You know them, since 2 years ago ;-)
This is what I'm talking about:

Portal 2 Released ?

As you probably know, Portal 2 is the sequel to the 2007 video game Portal.


This video will help you fill the gap between the two Portals:


You can watch the original comic here, or you can download the comic in PDF format.


Initially, the release was announced for March 5, 2010, but it was postponed to the week of April 18, 2011. The game was released in the States today by Valve, through both retail and Steam, for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X; PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions of the game were distributed by Electronic Arts. All versions of the game will become available simultaneously. It seems the launch date for Europe and Australia is April 21.


In Portal 2 the player returns as the human Chell, having been in stasis for several hundred years while the Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System(GLaDOS) and the rest of the Aperture Science facility has fallen into disrepair.

One of GLaDOS's personality cores awakens Chell and also GLaDOS; GLaDOS isn't happy with Chell's return and begins re-testing her through numerous chambers as she rebuilds the dilapidated facility. In Portal 2 the player is again challenged through numerous platforming and physics-based puzzles using the "portal gun"(aka Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device), this device can create temporary wormholes between almost any two flat surfaces. New gameplay elements have been added to Portal 2:

- tractor beams;
- laser redirection;
- special paint-like gels.

Portal 2 can be played in a two-player co-operative mode in which each player-character is a robot that has become self-aware due to GLaDOS' influence, and requires the players to work together with their own portal guns to complete each level.

Watch the teaser trailer and weep, you want it, don't you ?



So I don't know about you, but I just can't wait to get my hands on this game and play it *drool*.

Evinta available for pre-order on Amazon

Even though the official announcement on the site says the release date is May 30, Amazon says the item will be released on May 24. I already reserved my copy. Have YOU !?

Friday, April 15, 2011

Mixx.com aquired by UberMedia

Mixx.com website announces that Mixx was recently acquired by UberMedia

UberMedia is an independent developer of applications and web-based services for communication on Twitter and other social media platforms.
UberMedia, initially called TweetUp, was founded in early 2010 by Internet entrepreneur, Bill Gross, in an effort to provide Twitter users with a way to find the world’s best Tweeters on topics of particular interest and at the same time enable Tweeters to increase their following among people keen to hear what they have to say.

Later that year, the company began to bring together under one roof many of the leading Twitter clients or apps in order to provide a platform for innovation in user experiences across the many platforms through which Twitter users send and read Tweets.

Some of the well-known applications, like UberSocial, Echofon, and Twidroyd have been created by UberMedia. Twitter applications for smartphones like BlackBerry, iPhone and Android have also been developed by UberMedia. Twidroyd and UberTwitter are the first apps on the market to deploy LivePreview™ where any embedded link – web pages, blog posts, images and video – are displayed alongside the Tweet.

It seems UberMedia already started on upgrading and improving Mixx, the Mixx Classic website has been shutdown and now only displays a "we'll be back soon message" and a e-mail address collection form which subscribes you to a newsletter that will announce the relaunch of Mixx.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

My Dying Bride Announces Release Date For Evinta

My Dying Bride announced, on their official website, the launch date for the long expected album "Evinta". The album is an anniversary album, celebrating 20 years of My Dying Bride.

My Dying Bride were formed by Aaron, Andy, Calvin and Rick in the summer of 1990, and after only 6 months of writing together released the now legendary demo Towards The Sinister. Progress continued apace with the release of their first 7" single God Is Alone for the small French label Listenable. The single sold out almost immediately causing eager whispers in the underground, bringing them to the attention of Peaceville Records, who offered the band a deal.

The album was initially scheduled for an October 25th, 2010 release on Peaceville Records. And we waited, and we waited... And here it is, scheduled for May 30th 2011. Woo! 


The website announcement states:


"To commemorate two decades of doom and gloom from My Dying Bride, the band embarked upon a special project to re-work familiar melodies and themes from their extensive catalogue into long, flowing symphonic compositions, incorporating new vocals and passages from Aaron Stainthorpe. Sharing vocals is professional opera singer Lucie Roche, a talented soprano from France.
These arrangements have been brought to life in co-operation with keyboard maestro Johnny Maudling (of Bal Sagoth fame) as well as a clutch of talented classical musicians and will be released on May 30th as 'Evinta', as a 2 disc set & also a deluxe 3-disc edition with 64 page book, inspired by My Dying Bride's illustrious recordings of the past two decades."

The band announces the album as:

"Evinta. A project almost 15 years in the making. An idea that has sat smoldering and never really had a reason to burn alive until now. 9 albums worth of darkness recreated anew to mark 20 years of MDB. Music arranged to the soundscapes of sorrows past. Finally the 20th anniversary allows us to release this music in a form it has been desperately, woefully waiting for. Enjoy the Darkness."

Desperately waiting for it, it will be on repeat in all my playlists for a while now. If only they provided a few samples ...

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Make money online with PTC, part II : Neobux & Onbux

In my previous post I told you about Clixsense. Today I will tell you about Neobux and its twin site, Onbux.






NeoBux is a worldwide service available in a multi-language environment.
Neobux subscribers click on the advertiser's advertisement and view it during the amount of time specified by the advertiser. After viewing the advertisement, the user gets credited with a pre-determined amount of money in their NeoBux account. Registration is free. 

The amount of money each user earns varies between the user's membership, the type and quantity of advertisements the user has viewed, the number of referrals the user has and the number of advertisements those referrals view.

Unlike Clixsense, Neobux and Onbux let you rent referrals, which is a good thing, as the referrals you can rent are real people. Rented referrals are referrals you pay for, they are not free, like direct referrals would be. As direct referrals are quite hard to get, unless you have a brilliant marketing/advertising skill, you will work with rented referrals.

I will now show you a small strategy for working with rented referrals.
After you have signed up with either, Neobux or Onbux , start clicking the everyday ads, there will be an average number of four fixed 1 cent ads a day, and a indefinite number of smaller ads.

As a standard user of Neobux, this is how much you get paid per viewed ad:

Per click: $0.010 (Standard Exposure) · $0.015 (Extended Exposure)
Per referral click: $0.005 (Standard Exposure) · $0.010 (Extended Exposure)

While with Onbux standard membership, you earn $0.01 per click: and $0.005 per referral click.

When you have reached about 0.6$ you will be tempted to rent referrals, don't do it. Save until you get to 3$, you will now be able to rent 3 referrals for a month, and if they pay up and turn out it worth extending, you will have the funds to pay. If you don't have the funds, and they prove to be good clickers, and click everyday, you will be sorry, as you won't be able to keep them.

Of course, if you don't want to click your ways to renting referrals, you can invest, fund your account from your, let's say, paypal account. Anyway, now you have to funds to either recycle them, if they are slackers( it costs about 8 cents to recycle one referral), or to extend them, if they are everyday clickers(it costs up to 25 cents to extend them for a month).

After you rented them, turn Autopay on asap. Why ? Instead of you paying for the referral, they pay for themselves as long as you have Autopay turned on. Autopay subtracts one of the advertisements your referral view each day and puts it towards the 30 cents that referral needs to stick around for another month. So you get one less penny from each referral, but they will be your referral as long as they are active. 

Now keep clicking, and rent referrals in slices of 3 until you reach 300. Now you can stop and maintain the 300 you have until you get enough money to upgrade to golden. Upgrade to golden costs $90 per year for both, Onbux and Neobux. Now that you upgraded, your earnings per click and per referral click will double!

The secret is to keep renting referrals and DO NOT cash out! It will be a long, and maybe boring game, but it might worth it as it only asks a few minutes a day.
If a referral has not clicked today or yesterday and has click average of less than 2.0 then recycle it ($0.08).
If they have a click average of between 2.0 and 4.0, give them 4 days before you recycle them. 
Give those with an average of over 4.0 seven days to return and click . You don't want to recycle a good referral just because they were on vacation for a week.





You should wait the weekend before you recycle a referral, if a referral clicked on Friday, but on Sunday evening you noticed he did not click for the last 2 days, wait until Monday, see if he clicks.

Monday, April 11, 2011

Make money online with PTC, part I: Clixsense

Paid to click site/service, how it works: a paid to click site is actually an advertising company where advertisers pay for their ads to be viewed and subscribers get paid to view the ads.







Paid to click is commonly known, through the communities of people that are trying to make money online, as PTC.

PTC sites offer a commission to members for referring new members (just like the other affiliate marketing programs online), or they may pay members a percentage of the clicks that their referrals make as an ongoing commission.

Always check the terms of each PTC site you are planning to subscribe to. Some sites offer more money and suddenly change their terms, turning your earned thousands of money into just a few bucks.

PTC systems' profit can also come from the direct sales of referrals or upgrade packages which are created by the owner of each PTC site.

Scams are still heavily used by newcomers who are drawn in to the websites by search engines. Scam PTC sites are known to attract new users with cheap offers for upgrades and referrals and disappear without trace after a short time.

I have tried a few PTC programs myself, and I have found three sites that I think are the most trusted: Neobux, Onbux and Clixsense.

Clixsense provides several ways to earn money:
- by viewing advertisements that are in the system. You earn commissions for every ad you see. The amount per ad ranges from $0.001 and up to $0.02;
- through promoting others to the site with the affiliate program;
- through downline click commissions, upgrade commissions and a commission from your referrals's purchases.  
The amount you make all depends on your account status (Premium or Regular). Premium members earn higher downline click commissions from their referrals, are paid more for each ad they view, are entered into an 8 level affiliate program for premium upgrades and earn signup commissions of $0.20 for every active member they promote to ClixSense.
PREMIUM account status indicates to advertisers that the viewer has successfully made a purchase using a credit card or bank account online. The cost of ugrading to PREMIUM status is $14.95 USD and is valid for 1 year from the date of upgrade. There are many benefits that go along with being a PREMIUM member, like signup commissions, higher downline click commissions, more chances to win in ClixGrid, more ads available, an 8-Tier affiliate program that pays you for each referral that also upgrades to PREMIUM and much more.
Clixsense offers four different types of exposure for the PTC Ads. They are Micro, Mini, Standard and Extended. Each has a different exposure time that varies from 3 to 60 seconds and with different options available. They also require a different amount of Ad Credits per click.
Members will be more tempted to click on ads with longer exposure like the Standard or Extended and because of the longer exposure higher convertion rates are to be expected.
If you're just looking to increase your website's traffic, Micro or Mini are the best choices at very low cost, however these types have limited targeting options and statistics available.


MicroMiniStandardExtended
Timer (Seconds)3153060
Each Click Requires (Ad Credits)151020
Demographic Filter
Premium Filter
Detailed Statistics
Description Visible
100,000 Ad Credit Pack CPC *$0.0014$0.0070$0.0140$0.0280
* This is how much 1 click costs (CPC) if you buy a 100,000 Ad Credits PackBest Choice


The amount of ads, how often they appear and value of advertisements targeted to your specific profile is entirely dependent on the advertisers and will vary from day to day, even hour to hour.

Logging into your ClixSense account more frequently should will help you view more ads to you as you will find ads from smaller advertisers before they are consumed by other members.

ClixSense averages over 800 people logged in at most times. If an ad comes in that has 500 clicks available on it, the first 500 people who click this ad will see it. The other 300 will have to wait for other ads to come in.

You can get instant notifications of new ads by installing and the Clixsense toolbar, which is available for download here: http://clixsensecom.ourtoolbar.com/ .

If you are already a member of Clixsense and want to try something else, read part two.

Friday, April 8, 2011

Thursday, April 7, 2011

Linux like a tipi

What linux and a tipi have in common ?
click to enlarge

None of them have gates or windows, and both have apache inside !

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

New Bleeding Edge Gadget: Book!

Here is Book!

Bio-optically knowledge centre, revolutionary technological breakthrough. I does not require or use any wires, electrical circuits, batteries, connection. Book can be used anywhere, having no batteries, it doesn't need to be recharged and it can be used as long as necessary without electricity outlets. It never crashes nor it needs to be restarted.



You can simply open it and begin enjoy its great advantages. That's how it works.

BOOK is constructed of sequentially numbered sheets of paper and each one is capable of holding thousands of bits of information. Each page is scanned optically, registering information directly to your brain.
A simple finger drift takes us to the next page.
The sheets are held together by a device called "folder", that keeping them in the correct order.
With solid paper technology, manufacturer can use both sides, doubling the information and reducing the costs.
Most BOOKS include a functional 'index' to pinpoint the exact location of any selected information for instant retrieval.
The optional accessory "bookmark" allows the BOOK to open to the exact point where it was left in the previous session, even if the BOOK is closed. The bookmarks are in line with the international standards so that the same bookmark can be used in BOOKS from different manufacturers. Additionally, several bookmarks may be used in a single BOOK if the user wants to store different searches at once.
You can also make personal notes next to the BOOK's text entries with a simple programming tool, called "the pen".
The hands free device, also known as 'stand' allows the correct placement of BOOK for easy reading without using hands. If you need to turn the page, a simple shake of finger is enough.
BOOK is an environmental friendly product as it consists solely of 100% recyclable materials. Portable, durable and affordable, BOOK is being hailed as the forerunner of a new wave of entertainment.

Welcome to the era that will transform your way of understanding the world. Welcome to the experience of BOOK!

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

AT&T price hike for iPhone early upgrade

Bad news for AT&T customers that were hoping for a cheap iPhone upgrade.

Existing AT&T customers that were planning to upgrade their iPhone(3gs or 4G), must add $50 to the price that new customers, or expiring customers pay.

So now, with the $50 hike, prices for early upgrades are:



"This change reflects the increased costs, while still allowing us to offer customers the latest device before they qualify.", an AT&T spokesman said.

AT&T's "no commitment" prices did not go up and start from $499 for a 8GB iPhone 3GS and go up to $699 for a 32GB iPhone 4, and it's cheaper than Verizon, who charges $650 for a no-commitment 16GB iPhone 4 and $750 for the 32GB model.
Other than that, AT&T also offers a wide range of iPhone versions, with prices starting from $19 for a refurbished iPhone 3GS - 8 GB, while only the 16GB and 32GB versions of iPhone 4G are available with Verizon.

Monday, April 4, 2011

redsn0w update, jailbreak for Apple iOS 4.3.1 released!

iPhone Dev Team released, about 1 hour ago, the latest jailbreak tools for Apple iOS, version 4.3.1.

Attention ultrasn0w users: DO NOT update yet. You have to wait for ultrasn0w to be updated first, as there still are some incompatibilities when FW 4.3.1 is used on the older basebands supported by ultrasn0w. After you updat ultrasn0w, please make sure you get the 4.3.1 upate only via a custom IPSW from PwnageTool, Sn0wbreeze or xpwn!  Trying to restore or update to a stock IPSW will make you lose the unlock !

iPad 2 users: Do not try this update, it does not work for your product type!

Below you'll find a list of products you can apply this update:

  • iPhone3GS
  • iPhone4 (GSM)
  • iPod touch 3G
  • iPod touch 4G
  • iPad1
  • AppleTV 2G (PwnageTool only for now)
Credit, cheers, and everything nice for the 4.3.1 untether exploit go to Stefan Esser, a German security researcher. Last year Stefan implemented ASLR for jailbroken iPhones with the “antid0te” framework.

The easiest way to update is using redsn0w(which is available for both, Windows and Mac), make sure you check iClarified for some step-by-step guides and how-to.

 Download redsn0w 0.9.6rc9:
Download PwnageTool(Official Bittorent Release):